Road trips are as American as barbecues, fireworks, and families on the Fourth of July for good reasons. The United States, after all, is filled with great city and country roads, spectacular landscapes, and friendly people that make for a memorable road trip each and every time.
You will also love the diversity of routes available from the straight drives across alternatingly beautiful and desolate deserts to the dizzying switchbacks through mountain roads. Here are a few of the best road trips that you can make with your Budget rental car.
Road Trip for the Romantic
If you’re looking for romance with your partner, then the Pacific Coast Highway in California from Monterey to Morro Bay is your best bet. Known as the most romantic drive in the country, you will drive from the scenic landscapes of lush farms and azure beaches, awesome redwood trees and towering bridges, and waterfalls at the Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park and gorgeous sunsets at Big Sur. Along the way, you can sleep in Victorian bed-and-breakfasts, have lunch at a café in Carmel-by-the-Sea, and take in the sights at the famous Monterey Bay Aquarium.
Road Trip for the Wildlife Enthusiast
Yellowstone National Park is one of the best places to enjoy awe-inspiring panoramas filled with flora and fauna, many times of which are unlike anywhere else in the United States – or think of it as getting to Africa’s Serengeti Park without getting out of the country. With 82 miles from Jackson to Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, exclusive of the mileage within the park itself, you and your companions will have plenty of memories to make. You can take photos worthy of a professional photographer’s work, too, thanks to the abundance of wolves, elk, bison, moose, and bears as well as dozens of bird species in and around America’s first-ever national park.
Road Trip for the Thrill Seekers
With 70 miles of road between Routes 36 and 360, the road to Hana in Hawaii is a must for thrill seekers who want to combine adventure and nature. But be prepared because the roads are not exactly for the faint of heart or of stomach, no thanks to the narrow and winding road with hundreds of zigzagging curves coupled with dozens of one-lane bridges. Your reward: The breath-taking views of multi-tiered waterfalls, lush rainforests, and sparkling bodies of water that will make you want to relocate to Hawaii – or at least, extend your vacation in this tropical paradise.
Of course, be sure to plan your road trip well so that you will always be safe on the road.
